In most institutions a distinction exists between corporate governance which is primarily concerned with an institution's legal and financial standing, and academic governance which involves the integrity of its core activities of teaching and research. While governing bodies have unambiguous responsibility for all aspects of governance, only in post-1992 institutions do they have an explicit responsibility for determining "educational character and mission", and most boards delegate their responsibilities for academic governance to other bodies.
Generally, in higher education, there are at least three different 'understandings' of the term academic governance.
This lack of clarity about what academic governance means compounds a frequent concern of many external governors that they may have little information about the main outputs of the institution: teaching and research. However, this is now changing in most institutions, and the formal responsibilities of the governing body for oversight in this area are increasingly being implemented in practice. There are at least two reasons for such a change:
Against this background it is now difficult for any institution to argue that its governing body should have no role at all in academic matters.
A particular issue here is the relationship between the governing body and the senate /academic board. There may be sensitivities here, with some academic staff feeling that any move towards a greater involvement by the governing body in academic matters may be a potential threat to the participative systems of decision making that operated in the past.
In practice, relationships between these two bodies vary widely in different institutions. In some there may be almost no interaction at all, and the only form of contact may be the submission of the minutes of the senate/ academic board to the governing body (their minutes may not go the other way), coupled with some joint membership - most notably the vice-chancellor/ principal. In other cases there may be substantial joint working, and this is increasingly the case through mechanisms such as: joint committees, joint awaydays, and so on. For most institutions, a partnership approach to academic governance is likely to be most productive, which emphasises the separate responsibilities of the bodies concerned but also the need for close collaboration if effective academic governance is to be achieved.
These kinds of issues are leading a number of institutions to devise new forms of dealing with academic matters, which bridge the traditional academic and non-academic responsibilities of the governing body and senate/ academic board. Although joint committees are the most widespread way of doing this, there are other approaches - for example, one university has introduced an education strategy committee as a sub-committee of its governing body (with academic staff members), and intends this to be the focus for the development and monitoring of its education strategy. Such innovations are likely to become more common in the future.
Further Information:
· Chapter 9, A Guide for New Clerks and Secretaries of Governing Bodies of HEIs in the UK.
· Reviewing the Effectiveness of Academic Governance: a Framework to Help HEIs.